The Genius of Venice

Dial Parrott

ISBN 10: 0847840530 / ISBN 13: 9780847840533

Published by Rizzoli International Publications, US, 2013

About this Item

An ideal volume for lovers of Venice and architecture aficionados, combining in-depth history of this singular city with more than 100 color photographs and maps. Of Venice's many majestic spaces, none is as evocative and significant as the Piazza San Marco. An authoritative account of the development of the entire piazza complex, through which unfolds the history of the Republic in general, The Genius of Venice celebrates the city's oldest and most important architectural site. Dial Parrott's view of Venice is a heroic one. From their lagoon, the bold and calculating Venetians forged a city that stands today not merely as an attraction for millions, but as a testament to architectural genius: the epitome of what we now call New Urbanism and a shining example of Western communal art. Enhanced by more than 100 illustrations, The Genius of Venice presents the magnificent edifices of the piazza as, in the words of John Ruskin, the "living books of history" of this iconic urban environment.

Seller Inventory # LU-9780847840533

Bibliographic Details

• Title: The Genius of Venice
• Publisher: Rizzoli International Publications, US
• Publication Date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0847840530
• ISBN 13: 9780847840533
• Binding: Hardback
• Condition: New
• Weight: 1533 grams

About this title

Synopsis

An ideal volume for lovers of Venice and architecture aficionados, The Genius of Venice presents the unique history of Venice through the story of the Piazza San Marco and its development over eight centuries. It combines an authoritative account of the entire Piazza complex, the oldest, most important, and most evocative public space in this singular city, with more than 100 color photographs and maps. 

Dial Parrott's view of Venice is a heroic one. He portrays the medieval Venetian Republic as a consistent vanguard state, centuries ahead of the rest of Europe--economically, politically, and without doubt, architecturally. Venice experienced an architectural and artistic proto-Renaissance as early as the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. This is when she first created Piazza San Marco, using as her model a splendid late classical square in Constantinople, the old imperial capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. The book presents the Piazza as one of the supreme examples of Western communal art, the same architectural ethos that built the great medieval cathedrals of France and Germany. The work of architects and artists of great genius and skill, the Piazza ensemble is, above all, a communal artistic effort, a carefully crafted assemblage, merging changes in style and taste over 800 years. The Genius of Venice reveals the Piazza's magnificent edifices as the "living books of history" (John Ruskin) they were always meant to be.  

About the Author

Dial Parrott is a writer who lives in South Glastonbury, Connecticut with his wife Sally. Born and raised in Greenville, the capital city of the Mississippi Delta (a region often referred to as "the most Southern place on earth"), he graduated from Princeton University in 1966, then spent the summer working in a New York City poverty program before being drafted and spending a year in South Vietnam as a U.S. Army private. Before becoming a full-time writer in 2013, he worked as a journalist (beginning with a year on his hometown newspaper, the Delta Democrat-Times), a teacher at the University of Virginia (where he read English and American literature), and a practicing lawyer for 30 years in Hartford. His son Sam is an actor, and his son Max is a journalist; both live in Brooklyn, New York.